The flotation device was worn by Francatelli, a first-class passenger on the doomed ocean liner, as she escaped the sinking steamship on a lifeboat, according to auction records. It sold to an unidentified telephone bidder for well over the presale estimate of between 250,000 and 350,000 pounds, auctioneers reported. The life jacket is signed by Francatelli and other survivors from the same lifeboat, and it was described as the star among items in the sale by Henry Aldridge & Son.
The prices include an auction-house fee known as the buyer's premium, the auction house noted. A seat cushion from one of the Titanic lifeboats sold at the same auction for 390,000 pounds ($527,000) to the owners of two Titanic museums in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, and Branson, Missouri, auction officials said. 56 million pounds (almost $2 million at the time) paid in 2024 for a gold pocket watch given to the captain of RMS Carpathia, the ship that rescued 700 Titanic survivors, according to auction data.
Laura Mabel Francatelli was traveling with her employer, fashion designer Lucy Duff Gordon, and Lucy's husband Cosmo Duff Gordon, historical accounts show. All three survived in the ship's lifeboat No. 1, as documented in Titanic records.
Lifeboat No. 1 was launched carrying 12 people despite having capacity for 40, according to historical reports. Its failure to pick up survivors from the frigid water became a source of controversy, historians have noted.